Page:Face to Face With the Mexicans.djvu/391

Rh their own tongue. Not even the despised leperos are neglected, but with that exquisite "touch of nature" that he possesses, he finds and acknowledges kinship with these degraded pariahs. Guillermo Prieto is not merely a poet; he has served his country on many battlefields, and was the chief counselor of Benito Juarez during the most perilous days of Mexico's national existence.

Prieto's Romancero Nacional, published about a year ago, is a collection of historical incidents related in verse, and is so highly appreciated that the Federal Government has ordered it to be used in all the national colleges.

Even now, at the advanced age of eighty-one years, Señor Prieto holds the position of Professor of Ancient and Modern History in the Military College at Chapultepec, and has not only compiled a history of Mexico, for the cadets, but has written an excellent work on political economy for the instruction of his pupils.

"The Mexican Longfellow" is Juan dc Dios Peza, whose exquisite poems are best appreciated by the aristocratic and cultivated classes. Señor Peza has now in press a volume of Indian traditions.

The distinguished philologist, Don Francisco Pimentel, is also a litérateur, but, with a noble and holy object, has devoted the greater part of his life to the study of the native Mexican languages, and now speaks twelve of the Indian dialects. Señor Pimentel has greatly encouraged the study of the Nahuatl and Ottomie languages in the Government School of Agriculture, because he fully coincides in the opinion of the great educator and philanthropist, Señor Herrera, who maintains that the only way to elevate the Indian races is to learn their native dialects and then go to their pueblos, or tribal settlements, to instruct them in those matters most essential to their mental and moral development. Señor Pimentel is a member of various scientific and literary societies in France, Germany, and the United States.

Alfredo Chavero, although more generally known in Europe and in this country as an archaeologist, is not only a literary man but an eminent lawyer, and is to-day president of the Chamber of Deputies. His